By David Gold
August 24 – Russian football’s growing strength and financial muscle has been flexed this week as Cameroon forward Samuel Eto’o became the world’s best paid player as he signed for big spending Anzhi Makhachkala.
Eto’o is also among the world’s best paid sportspeople as a result of the move, as despite not earning as large a salary before tax as NBA star Kobe Bryant, Russia’s more favourable tax rates mean his take home pay is greater.
The only sports star whose salary could eclipse the prolific forward is former Formula One world champion Fernando Alonso, who is thought to earn €27.6 million (£24.2 million/$40.1 million)) racing for Ferrari.
Eto’o will take home wages of 856.9 million roubles (£17.9 million/$29.7 million/€20.5 million) per year after tax, after completing a transfer from Italian giants Inter Milan worth over a billion roubles (£22 million/$36 million/€25 million).
It means that the former Real Mallorca, Real Madrid and Barcelona forward eclipses the wages of Real Madrid forward Cristiano Ronaldo €12 million (£10.5 million/$17 million) and Barcelona’s World Player of the Year Lionel Messi €10.5 million (£9.2 million/$15.2 million).
The Russian side from the war torn Dagestan region are bankrolled by billionaire Suleiman Kerimov, and the signing of the Cameroon star represents the latest in a line of high profile signings by Anzhi in recent months.
They also succeeded in signing Roberto Carlos from Brazilian club Corinthians in February, and have since made a number of multi million pound moves for big name players across Europe, including PSV Eindhoven’s Balázs Dzsudzsák and Chelsea left back Yuri Zhirkov.
Keirimov is looking to revitalise the region, and is building a new 45,000 seater stadium as well as hotels and training camps.
A number of other Russian clubs have wealthy backers, with Leonid Fedun at Spartak Moscow and FC Krasnodar’s Sergei Galitsky both billionaires, whilst champions Zenit St. Petersburg are bankrolled by oil giant Gazprom.
The increasing wealth of the Russian Premier League has catapulted its teams up to seventh in the UEFA Coefficents ranking which determines how many teams play in each European competition each season.
A new TV deal which could double the league’s income in the coming years should consolidate their growth further still, though they will face the challenge of having to balance their books more carefully in the coming years with the introduction of the UEFA financial fair play regulations, which require clubs to balance their books over rolling three year periods.
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